{"id":357,"date":"2010-10-12T05:33:25","date_gmt":"2010-10-12T10:33:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=357"},"modified":"2026-07-13T13:48:58","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T17:48:58","slug":"album-review-brute-force-confections-of-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2010\/10\/12\/album-review-brute-force-confections-of-love\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Brute Force – Confections of Love"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you ever sit around pondering unlikely musical scenarios? Strange, uncharted-waters of stylistic combinations? Well, if that sort of thing interests you, you’ll know about — or want<\/em> to know about — Confections of Love<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Originally released in (believe it or not) 1967, the album credited to I, Brute Force<\/strong> was (and remains) actually Stephen Friedland<\/strong>, an American singer\/songwriter. But a listen to Confections of Love<\/em> answers the all-too-infrequently asked musical question, “What would it sound like if a late sixties easy listening artist dropped acid?”<\/p>\n

Yes, Confections of Love<\/em> is strange. Deeply, deeply strange, in fact. Difficult to describe, the music on the record is sort of a cross between Frank Zappa<\/a><\/strong> and Mason Williams<\/a><\/strong>. File it under: Incredibly Strange. Yet it’s oddly appealing, in a truly off-kilter way. Kitschy MOR arrangements of the spare-no-expense variety start things off in a fairly normal way, but then the nasally vocals of Brute come in. And if that’s not an odd enough juxtaposition, the lyrics of a track like “In Jim’s Garage” push things right over the edge. Sound effects and vocal intercessions call to mind the showier moments of Jim Steinman<\/strong>‘s work with Meat Loaf<\/strong>, but this was way back in 1967, long before that style would gain any commercial traction.<\/p>\n

The record’s arrangements are faultless. This is most definitely not rock’n’roll: tympanis, big trap kits, horn sections, strings…they’re all here, nearly overstuffed in a way that would make one expect to hear the songs on a variety show of the era, something like the Smothers Brothers<\/strong> show.<\/p>\n

But the lyrics are far too strange, the subjects too idiosyncratic for that kind of commercial exposure. “The Sad Sad World of Mothers and Fathers” is a very stagy number that wouldn’t seem out of place in an off-off-Broadway show…on acid. Even though Brute’s voice isn’t what most would consider conventionally appealing, there’s something irresistible about these songs.<\/p>\n

“Tierra Del Fuego” sounds like Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass<\/strong> with a hopelessly nerdy vocalist…on acid. On “No Olympian Height” Brute aims for a Donovan<\/strong> vocal style. He doesn’t pull it off, but the schmaltzy arrangement is, again, oddly appealing. “Cudd’ly” goes for a musical arrangement familiar to fans of, say, the New Vaudeville Band<\/strong> and certain lesser tracks from Spanky and our Gang<\/strong> or Sopwith “Camel.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nobody seems too sure exactly what the inimitably weird “Sitting on a Sandwich” is actually about, but that ambiguity doesn’t detract from enjoyment of this tune. “Brute’s Circus Metaphor” is among the most musically intriguing numbers on Confections of Love<\/em>, and lyrically it’s as described: an intentionally heavy-handed metaphoric meditation on love. Delivered with just the right amount of tongue in cheek, it’s surprisingly catchy.<\/p>\n

“Brute’s Party” ups the strangeness ante, if such a thing seems possible. “As Long as My Song Lives” moves closest to the aforementioned Mason Williams territory, but the lyrics betray a malevolent streak behind the silly mask. Leave it to Brute to write a song called “Tapeworm of Love,” another metaphoric rumination on the vagaries of love. The big, bouncy arrangement almost obscures the unnervingly strange (and dark) lyrical content.<\/p>\n

The original Confections of Love<\/em> disc wrapped up with “Making Faces at Each Other,” a song which is — you guessed it — strange. Here Brute pulls out all the stops arrangement-wise. The 2010 reissue on Bar\/None includes three more tracks dating from the late ’66 Confections of Love<\/em> sessions, and the best of these is “Conjugation,” a track that bizarrely presages the whole Schoolhouse Rock<\/em> phenomenon. On acid, that is.<\/p>\n

But the real bonus highlight is the inclusion of both sides of the infamous Apple Records 1968 single, “Nobody Knows” b\/w “King of Fuh.” The latter managed to keep the song from getting stocked in stores, and now ranks among the rarest of Beatles-related items. George Harrison<\/strong> championed its release, and reportedly John Lennon<\/strong> was a fan of Brute Force.<\/p>\n

If you’re in just the right frame of mine (and\/or on acid) you too might dig Confections of Love<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you ever sit around pondering unlikely musical scenarios? Strange, uncharted-waters of stylistic combinations? Well, if that sort of thing interests you, you’ll know about — or want to know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review","cat-65-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31926,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357\/revisions\/31926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}